await the dawn. On a battlefield, amusements will be many.' Swords Creek, Mistledale, Flamerule 17
'Yes?' Sylune inquired, turning from her lamp and mirror and raising an imperious eyebrow. On either side of the tent door, Belkram and Itharr stared out and raised their blades warily, waiting.
'Your servant, Lady,' said the voice outside. A man's voice. A familiar man's voice.
'Yes, Torm?' Sylune asked, a trifle wearily. The two Harpers relaxed, trading grins across the dim tent mouth. 'Come to undress me? Or just to collect all your Lingerie?'
'No,' the thief said in a low voice. 'May I come in?'
Sylune turned to Sharantyr, who nodded. The three Harpers were sleeping in all but their boots, drawn swords to hand, and had already lain down. The Witch of Shadowdale was sitting up before a mirror, looking at the body she might well lose again on the morrow. 'Yes-but leave your pranks outside the door. I'm not in the mood.'
'Your command is my wish, as I believe Elminster once said,' Torm said with just a hint of his usual impishness, looking warily into the tent. Belkram and Itharr saluted him silently with their blades; he answered them with a sardonic lift of his brows, and stepped into the tent. He was holding something behind his back.
Sylune turned on her stool to face him. With the candlelight behind her, lighting her silver hair into flame, she looked unearthly as well as beautiful. 'Well, Torm?'
'I… ah, I came to do your hair,' Torm said, bringing a fistful of combs and a tiny scent bottle into view. All four folk in the tent stared at him, and his face grew pinker. Looking down at his hands, he said, 'I seem to have grown used to it.' He looked up at Sylune. 'If you don't mind?'
The smile that the Witch of Shadowdale gave him then took his heart away. Torm swallowed as she stretched forth her hands to him. 'Mind? I am honored. Please!'
As Torm stepped forward, eyes shining, Belkram said kindly, 'Haul your tongue in, there's a good boy. We've done the tent floor already, and you'll look more sensible with it safely stowed away.'
Sharantyr shot her comrade a sharp look, but Torm did not even turn around.
'I know it's been said before,' he said calmly, 'but if you go around giving folk a piece of your clever mind, Belkram, soon enough you'll have none left for yourself.'
Belkram spread his hands in apology. 'Aye, it's the real Torm. Sorry for shattering your gesture, sir. With all these shapeshifters around, one can't be too careful.'
Torm rounded on him then. ' 'Too careful'?' he asked, incredulously. 'You folk make berserkers look like timid moles! When you discover what the word 'careful' means, come and tell me! You certainly haven't displayed any great store of it thus far! I doubt Elminster'd dare to do what you have… let alone this thief!'
'He's right, you know,' Sharantyr said with a chuckle.
'Of course he's right,' Itharr told her. 'We've just been charging ahead as fast as we could into peril after peril, hoping the gods, our foes, and ourselves alike wouldn't notice what reckless fools we're being, and pay us off for it! And now he's gone and spoiled it, and on the eve of battle, too! Bad thief! Naughty, naughty bad thief!'
The tent erupted in helpless laughter. In the night outside, two Rider sentries exchanged wondering glances, and shook their heads.
'Harpers and adventurers… crazed wits, if you ask me,' one said feelingly.
'No argument here,' his fellow replied, watching the darkness around warily. Something glided past-and he tensed to shout and hurl his spear-until he saw that it was only an owl. Another owl flapped along in its wake. Now that was something rarely seen.
The guard frowned at the two birds as the night swallowed them again. He shrugged. As long as they weren't arrows, dragons, or flying wizards, things in the sky were no concern of his. He yawned and peered all around again, seeking real danger. Galath's Roost, Mistledale, Flamerule 17
'The wizard said it was deserted, and safe,' the Zhentilar swordcaptain grunted, 'but we know all about wizards, don't we, lads? Swords out, watch wary, and be ready for the worst!' He glared around at the Zhentilar soldiers and told them, 'I don't want to lose one of you because someone wasn't looking, or was thinking about his mistress back at the Keep, or how many coins this or that jack owed him. So take yer time, and let's do this the right way. Torches and mage lights to the fore.'
There was a creaking and rattling, and the men moved as one. Then the only sound was the soft whisper and rustle of disturbed foliage. The first scouts of the Sword of the South advanced up the steep, thickly forested slope toward the ruin of Galath's Roost.
When the foremost man was an easy ten paces from the overgrown stones of a wall, he turned and shrieked like an owl, thrice. In response, the mage lights drifted silently forward, over the helmed heads of the soldiers, into the dark and hollow places of stone ahead.
Nothing moved. There was no sound that could not be put down to small things that flap or scuttle in a forest by night. Cautiously the Zhentilar moved forward, swords out, probing the ferns and brambles ahead for spring bows, trip cords, and pits. They found nothing.
From here and there along the edges of the ruin, double owl hoots rang out as scout after scout signalled his safe entry into the keep. Files of men bearing torches began to work their way through the trees in answer to the calls.
A scout halted in a dark chamber, hearing the stony scrape of something moving to his right, through an archway thick with vines and mottled moss. 'Be that you, Baeremuth?' The whisper was cautious, and the reply was quick and low.
'Aye. Fflarast?'
'Me,' Fflarast confirmed, turning his loaded hand crossbow aside to prevent any accidents. 'Anything of interest?'
'Lots of rubble, and something's nest… vole bones an' the like. I think this place really is deserted.'
'Good. Crazed orders, hacking through the woods in the dark just to camp in a ruin, but…'
'Better'n trying to fight our way into Mistledale down that bow-shot throat, if we'd taken the road. They must have at least a dozen archers-an' a dozen's all they'd need, Fflar, to take down four hundred or more of us, for sure. This way, we can strike out of the woods all along the south side of the dale. Those farmers'll run themselves crazed trying to be everywhere at once to stop us.'
'You plot like a swordlord,' Fflarast muttered. 'We'd better get on, or Dellyn'll be running his blade up our backsides and bellowing at us for being a pair of craven laggards or spies for the enemy.'
'Huh. He sees spies under every stone, that one,' Baeremuth replied, and suited actions to words by turning over a rock that was suspiciously damp among dry, dusty ones.
There was a sudden rush of rubble and a crash that shook the room. Fflarast cursed and staggered back, trying to keep his feet, but ended up sitting down hard on rubble. When he'd scrambled up and could see again through the rising dust, his mouth went suddenly dry.
Baeremuth Asanter lay under a fallen block of stone nearly as large as a pack mule. Thin rivers of blood were running out from beneath it-and Fflar could just see the tips of the fingers of one hand, reaching vainly for aid. It would reach forever now.
7
Fflarast Blackriver peered again at his comrade's remains and then backed away very carefully. The rock-fall hadn't been accidental.
Someone had gone to a lot of trouble with wooden wedges and spars and balanced stones-and even flung dust around afterward to hide their work. The wedges were the bright hue of newly cut wood; this had been done within the last day or so.
'Oh, Bane preserve us,' Fflarast whispered, backing out of the chamber. At that moment, a heavy booming off to the right marked the discovery of another trap. It was followed by a faint, raw screaming that went on for a long time before ending suddenly in a gurgle. Fflarast knew those sounds. Someone had put a half-crushed man out of his agony with a quick sword thrust to the throat.
